"My Life as a Villainess"

New from William Morrow: My Life as a Villainess: Essays by Laura Lippman.

About the book, from the publisher:

Meet the Woman Behind the Books…

In this collection of new and previously published essays, New York Times bestselling author Laura Lippman offers her take on a woman's life across the decades. Her childhood and school years, her newspaper career, her experiences as a novelist—Lippman finds universal touchstones in an unusual life that has as many twists as her award-winning crime fiction.

Essays include:

• · Men Explain The Wire to Me 

• · Game of Crones

• · My Life as a Villainess

• · My Father’s Bar 

• · The 31st Stocking

These candid essays offer long-time readers insight into the experiences that helped Lippman become one of the most successful crime novelists of her generation.

Visit Laura Lippman's website.

The Page 69 Test: Another Thing to Fall.

The Page 69 Test: What the Dead Know.

The Page 69 Test/Page 99 Test: Life Sentences.

The Page 69 Test: I'd Know You Anywhere.

The Page 69 Test: The Most Dangerous Thing.

The Page 69 Test: Hush Hush.

The Page 69 Test: Wilde Lake.

My Book, the Movie: Wilde Lake.

The Page 69 Test: Sunburn.

The Page 69 Test: Lady in the Lake.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Miss Graham’s Cold War Cookbook"

New from William Morrow Paperbacks: Miss Graham's Cold War Cookbook: A Novel by Celia Rees.

About the book, from the publihser:

World War II has just ended, and Britain has established the Control Commission for Germany, which oversees their zone of occupation. The Control Commission hires British civilians to work in Germany, rebuild the shattered nation and prosecute war crimes. Somewhat aimless, bored with her job as a provincial schoolteacher, and unwilling to live with her overbearing mother any longer, thirtysomething Edith Graham applies for a job with the Commission—but she is also recruited by her cousin, Leo, who is in the Secret Service. To them, Edith is perfect spy material...single, ordinary-looking, with a college degree in German. Cousin Leo went to Oxford with one of their most hunted war criminals, Count Kurt von Stavenow, who Edith remembers all too well from before the war. He wants her to find him.

Intrigued by the challenge, Edith heads to Germany armed with a convincing cover story: she's an unassuming Education Officer sent to help resurrect German schools. To send information back to her Secret Service handlers in London, Edith has crafted the perfect alter ego, cookbook author Stella Snelling, who writes a popular magazine cookery column. She embeds crucial intelligence within the recipes she collects. But occupied Germany is awash with other spies, collaborators, and opportunists, and as she's pulled into their world, Edith soon discovers that no one is what they seem to be. The closer she gets to uncovering von Stavenow's whereabouts--and the network of German civilians who still support him--the greater the danger.

With a unique, compelling premise, Miss Graham's Cold War Cookbook is a beautifully crafted and gripping novel about daring, betrayal, and female friendship.

Visit Celia Rees's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Death at High Tide"

New from Minotaur Books: Death at High Tide: An Island Sisters Mystery (Volume 1) by Hannah Dennison.

About the book, from the publisher:

Death at High Tide is the delightful first installment in the Island Sisters series by Hannah Dennison, featuring two sisters who inherit an old hotel in the remote Isles of Scilly off the coast of Cornwall and find it full of intrigue, danger, and romance.

When Evie Mead’s husband, Robert, suddenly drops dead of a heart attack, a mysterious note is found among his possessions. It indicates that Evie may own the rights to an old hotel on Tregarrick Rock, one of the Isles of Scilly.

Still grieving, Evie is inclined to leave the matter to the accountant to sort out. Her sister Margot, however, flown in from her glamorous career in LA, has other plans. Envisioning a luxurious weekend getaway, she goes right ahead and buys two tickets—one way—to Tregarrick.

Once at the hotel—used in its heyday to house detective novelists, and more fixer-upper than spa resort, after all—Evie and Margot attempt to get to the bottom of things. But the foul-tempered hotel owner claims he's never met the late Robert, even after Evie finds framed photos of them—alongside Robert's first wife—in his office. The rest of the island inhabitants, ranging from an ex-con receptionist to a vicar who communicates with cats, aren't any easier to read.

But when a murder occurs at the hotel, and then another soon follows, frustration turns to desperation. There’s no getting off the island at high tide. And Evie and Margot, the only current visitors to Tregarrick, are suspects one and two. It falls to them to unravel secrets spanning generations—and several of their own—if they want to make it back alive.

Visit Hannah Dennison's website and Facebook page.

The Page 69 Test: Murder at Honeychurch Hall.

My Book, The Movie: Murder at Honeychurch Hall.

My Book, The Movie: Deadly Desires at Honeychurch Hall.

The Page 69 Test: Deadly Desires at Honeychurch Hall.

The Page 69 Test: A Killer Ball at Honeychurch Hall.

--Marshal Zeringue

"A Desperate Place"

New from Crooked Lane Books: A Desperate Place: A McKenna and Riggs Novel by Jennifer Greer.

About the book, from the publisher:

Three separate homicides. Three unrelated victims. One grisly secret.

When the body of famous actress Niki Francis is unearthed from its shallow grave, the small town of Medford, Oregon is alarmed, but not shook. After all, there should be plenty of motives and suspects–Niki had fame, wealth, looks. The kill was targeted, premeditated, and it’s about her celebrity. Or so they thought.

Whit McKenna is licking her wounds, working as a reporter for the local Medford rag. Fresh from a harrowing assignment for her previous post at the L. A. Times which cost her her husband, Whit must pull herself together for the sake of her two daughters. The wound has hardly begun to scab when she’s called to cover the murder, so she teams up with her best friend, medical examiner Katie Riggs. Then two more victims turn up, completely disconnected from one another, and McKenna loses all hope of a breakthrough.

Rather than clarity, the possible suspects and motives become scrambled. But time is running out, and each front page article McKenna writes brings her closer to a killer who will stop at nothing to realize a deadly vision.

Visit Jennifer Greer's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Queen of Tuesday"

New from Random House: The Queen of Tuesday by Darin Strauss.

About the book, from the publisher:

From the award-winning, bestselling author of Chang & Eng and Half a Life, a new novel about Lucille Ball, a thrilling love story starring Hollywood’s first true media mogul.

This indelible romance begins with a daring conceit—that the author’s grandfather may have had an affair with Lucille Ball. Strauss offers a fresh view of a celebrity America loved more than any other.

Lucille Ball—the most powerful woman in the history of Hollywood—was part of America’s first high-profile interracial marriage. She owned more movie sets than did any movie studio. She more or less single-handedly created the modern TV business. And yet Lucille’s off-camera life was in disarray. While acting out a happy marriage for millions, she suffered in private. Her partner couldn’t stay faithful. She struggled to balance her fame with the demands of being a mother, a creative genius, an entrepreneur, and, most of all, a symbol.

The Queen of Tuesday—Strauss’s follow-up to Half a Life, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award—mixes fact and fiction, memoir and novel, to imagine the provocative story of a woman we thought we knew.

Follow Darin Strauss on Twitter.

The Page 99 Test: Half a Life.

Writers Read: Darin Strauss (October 2010).

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Monsters We Make"

New from Crooked Lane Books: The Monsters We Make: A Novel by Kali White.

About the book, from the publisher:

For fans of Rene Denfeld and Shari Lapena comes a rich, atmospheric family drama set in the 1980’s following the disappearances of two paperboys from a small midwestern town.

It’s August 1984, and paperboy Christopher Stewart has gone missing.

Hours later, twelve-year-old Sammy Cox hurries home from his own paper route, red-faced and out of breath, hiding a terrible secret.

Crystal, Sammy’s seventeen-year-old sister, is worried by the disappearance but she also sees opportunity: the Stewart case has echoes of an earlier unsolved disappearance of another boy, one town over. Crystal senses the makings of an award winning essay, one that could win her a scholarship – and a ticket out of their small Iowa town.

Officer Dale Goodkind can’t believe his bad luck: another town and another paperboy kidnapping. But this time he vows that it won’t go unsolved. As the abductions set in motion an unpredictable chain of violent, devastating events touching each life in unexpected ways, Dale is forced to face his own demons.

Told through interwoven perspectives–and based on the real-life Des Moines Register paperboy kidnappings in the early 1980’s–The Monsters We Make deftly explores the effects of one crime exposing another and the secrets people keep hidden from friends, families, and sometimes, even themselves.

Visit Kali White's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Before You Go"

New from Harper: Before You Go: A Novel by Tommy Butler.

About the book, from the publisher:

A big, rich, life-affirming debut that explores the most perplexing questions of existence: purpose, the pain of loneliness, the desire for happiness, and the price we pay as we search for fulfillment.

In the Before, humankind is created with a hole in its heart, the designers not realizing their mistake—if it was a mistake—until too late.

Elliot Chance is just a boy, and knows nothing of this. All he knows is that he doesn’t feel at home in this world, and his desire for escape becomes more urgent as he grows into adulthood, where the turbulence of life seems to offer no cure for the emptiness. Desperate and lost, he stumbles upon a support group on the edge of Manhattan. There he meets two other drifting souls—Sasha, a young woman who leaves coded messages in the copy she writes for advertising campaigns, and Bannor, whose detailed depictions of the future make Elliot think he may have actually been there. With these two unlikely allies, Elliot launches into the business of life, determined to be happy in spite of himself.

Yet the hole in the heart is not so easily filled.

Profound yet playful, Before You Go is a beautiful, imaginative journey into the ache and wonder of being human, and the quest for a meaningful life.

Visit Tommy Butler's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"Chasing Starlight"

New from Tor Teen: Chasing Starlight by Teri Bailey Black.

About the book, from the publisher:

1938. The Golden Age of Hollywood. Palm trees and movie stars. Film studios pumping out musicals and gangster films at a furious pace. Everyone wants to be a star—except society girl and aspiring astronomer Kate Hildebrand. She’s already famous after a childhood tragedy turned her into a newspaper headline. What she craves now is stability.

But when Kate has to move to Hollywood to live with her washed-up silent film star grandfather, she walks into a murder scene and finds herself on the front page again. She suspects one of the young men boarding in her grandfather’s run-down mansion is the killer—or maybe even her grandfather.

Now, Kate must discover the killer while working on the set of a musical—and falling in love. Will her stars align so she can catch the murderer and live the dream in Old Hollywood? Or will she find that she’s just chasing starlight?

Visit Teri Bailey Black's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Doctor of Aleppo"

New from Blackstone: The Doctor of Aleppo: A Novel by Dan Mayland.

About the book, from the publisher:

While working in the ancient Silk Road city of Aleppo, American Hannah Johnson and her Swedish lover Oskar are drawn into the mounting turbulence of the impending Syrian civil war.

After Oskar is wounded at a street protest one evening, he and Hannah cross paths with Dr. Samir Hasan, a renowned surgeon. As the protests swell into all-out war, Dr. Hasan tends not only to Oskar, but also risks his life, his practice, and his family to tend to a nephew the government has branded an insurgent.

Dr. Hasan’s humanitarian activities come to the attention of a vengeful, Javert-like secret police officer whose son’s death on Dr. Hasan’s watch triggers a series of events that will drag Hannah and Oskar deeper into the war and put Hannah and Dr. Hasan in the officer’s crosshairs.

Both intimate and sweeping in scope, The Doctor of Aleppo lends insight into how the most brutal, devastating war of the twenty-first century is mirrored on the personal scale, leaving scars that can never be healed.

Visit Dan Mayland's website.

--Marshal Zeringue

"The Silent Wife"

New from William Morrow: The Silent Wife: A Novel by Karin Slaughter.

About the book, from the publisher:

He watches. He waits. He takes. Who will be next...

THE SILENT WIFE

Investigating the killing of a prisoner during a riot inside a state penitentiary, GBI investigator Will Trent is confronted with disturbing information. One of the inmates claims that he is innocent of a brutal attack for which he has always been the prime suspect. The man insists that he was framed by a corrupt law enforcement team led by Jeffrey Tolliver and that the real culprit is still out there—a serial killer who has systematically been preying on women across the state for years. If Will reopens the investigation and implicates the dead police officer with a hero’s reputation of wrongdoing, the opportunistic convict is willing to provide the information GBI needs about the riot murder.

Only days ago, another young woman was viciously murdered in a state park in northern Georgia. Is it a fluke, or could there be a serial killer on the loose?

As Will Trent digs into both crimes it becomes clear that he must solve the cold case in order to find the answer. Yet nearly a decade has passed—time for memories to fade, witnesses to vanish, evidence to disappear, and lies to become truth. But Will can’t crack either mystery without the help of the one person he doesn’t want involved: his girlfriend and Jeffrey Tolliver’s widow, medical examiner Sara Linton.

When the past and present begin to collide, Will realizes that everything he values is at stake...

Visit Karin Slaughter's website.

--Marshal Zeringue